Chapter 89: Picking an Outfit

POV: Carly

"How do these banquet things even work?" Niko asked, aimlessly digging through his closet.

Carly bit down on a grin, setting her book aside to climb off his bed and join him.

"Well, for starters, no Henleys or jeans allowed. It's formal. Suit required. Black tie optional."

He turned to face her, smirking. "Which means you'll be in formal attire too. I'll finally get to see you in a pretty little dress. Emphasis on little."

"Sorry to disappoint. I'll be in my cheer uniform all night."

"Short skirt instead? Even better."

She raised an eyebrow. "Oh, you have a secret cheerleader fantasy you've never mentioned?"

"I do, actually." He tucked a strand of hair behind her ear. "It's always starring you."

She scrunched her nose. "Cheesy."

He arched a brow and pulled her against him by the hips before she could react, drawing a surprised yelp out of her. Their noses brushed before their mouths met, soft at first, then deepening the way it always did lately — both of them smiling into it without meaning to. His thumbs traced the bare skin peeking out from under her shirt while she gripped his arms, and he started walking them backward, lips never leaving hers, until the backs of her knees hit the mattress.

She laughed against his mouth and pushed him back gently.

"Nope. No more distracting me." She said, answering his confused look by wriggling free of his hold. "I was enjoying my book, and you need to pick an outfit."

Niko huffed. "Are you saying Fitzgerald is more entertaining than a few pleasurable moments with your very needy boyfriend before he has to face the masses?"

"You both have a flair for the dramatics." She teased, settling back onto the bed and reaching for her novel.

He pressed a hand to his chest. "Ouch, love." Then, softer: "Honestly, though, you haven't really said how you feel about your mother showing up tonight."

Carly's eyes flicked up sharply.

"You clearly weren't thrilled about her appearance, considering you didn't even want to tell me about it. I just want to make sure you're okay." He added gently.

Niko rarely talked about his own family. Carly realized, sitting there, that she hadn't really talked about hers either. After her father left, it had just been her, her mother, and her coven. Nothing close to the sprawling Monroeson family tree.

She closed the book with a sigh. "I'm fine. I mean, I guess I am. Me and my mom's relationship is complicated. Conditional, really. We're not close."

"Conditional love from a parent? You're preaching to the choir, love."

She gave a half smile. "Remember what happened in the cafeteria that day?"

"You mean when you nearly knocked the whole room unconscious with a sonic wail? Still recovering, actually." He smirked.

She rolled her eyes. "I meant after. The nosebleed, almost blacking out. That wasn't the first time that's happened to me."

His grin fell into something more serious. It startled him, a little, how quickly his first instinct now was to reach for her, to want to fix whatever this was. He hadn't known that instinct existed in him before she came along. And the idea that she'd had more than one brush with something close to dying made him want to start a war with the world.

She sighed before continuing. "I was twelve the first time I learned that spell. Me and Whitney studied it religiously, every day after school. Practiced it constantly, failed constantly. I didn't even care about mastering something that advanced, I was just having fun with my best friend."

Niko caught the way her voice dipped on Whitney's name. She rarely brought her up around him anymore, but he knew her well enough to know that loss hadn't even begun healing.

"Anyway." She sniffled. "I used to love it. Learning new spells, embracing what it meant to be a witch. Until my mom got involved. It's just been me and her since my dad left, and it wasn't always terrible, but she turned everything into a competition. As her daughter, I had to be exceptional. That was the only time she really paid attention to anything I did, and as a kid whose own father walked out the moment her powers showed up, that was all I wanted. So I gave her what she wanted. Practiced that spell day and night for two months until it was perfect. Until I was perfect." Her voice caught.

The pressure in Niko's chest only grew the longer she talked.

"And it was worth it, because I actually got it." Carly said, a flash of pride breaking through. "Youngest witch in our coven's history to master something that advanced. My mom was so proud of me when I performed it for her. I'd never seen her smile like that before." A bittersweet little smile of her own. "Then I showed it off at school the next day. It worked, until I started bleeding from my nose. Then my ears. I didn't even hear the screaming because I'd already blacked out. The spell was too powerful, and despite the skill, I was too young for it. I pushed past what my body could handle. Twelve years old, and I genuinely thought I was dying."

His fingers twitched, desperate for a cigarette, for a glass of blood, for anything that might distract him from the picture forming in his head — her, cold and alone and afraid.

He cleared his throat, not trusting himself to speak until she finished.

"Next thing I remember is waking up at home, tucked in bed with the worst headache of my life, and my mom sitting right there beside me. I was just a scared kid looking for comfort. You want to know the first thing she said to me?" A bitter little laugh. "'Accidents happen, darling. You'll be more prepared next time. You always are.'"

There was nothing joyful in that laugh.

"Her only child nearly died, and all she could think about was how I'd do better next time." Carly ran her fingers through her curls, trying to distract herself from how badly she wanted to cry, then covered her reddened eyes with both hands.

"My mom has never come to a single one of my extracurriculars unless she absolutely had to." Carly went on. "She never wanted to hear about cheer, or the homecoming committee, none of it, unless it involved witchcraft. I was second in command on most of those committees until this year too — which meant I wasn't the best. And a McPherson always has to be the best."

His eyebrows pulled together as she kept going.

"You want to know why she's actually coming tonight? Because now I'm the top girl. Cheer captain, leader of basically every committee, reigning supreme witch. Everything she ever wanted me to be. I'm just another thing for her to show off."

Niko didn't know whether to feel sick or murderous. He'd known her father left when she was young. He hadn't known the reason, and he definitely hadn't known Leona McPherson was an even more calculating woman than he'd already assumed.

All this time he'd painted Carly as some untouchable princess, when she'd been carrying this her entire life.

Maybe they had more in common than either of them ever expected.

"And you still haven't cut her off." He said, arms crossed tight.

"She's my mom, Niko." Carly reasoned.

"Who treats you like a trophy." He shot back. "I don't care who she is. Being your mother doesn't excuse any of that."

She swallowed hard.

His harshness, he knew, came from somewhere else too. From his own upbringing, raised by parents who never once made him feel chosen.

He exhaled slowly. "I'm sorry, love. It's not you, it's just — it took me over a hundred years to actually cut ties with my own family. Not because I didn't want to sooner, but because I didn't have anyone telling me I deserved better from people who were supposed to care. Hearing you went through something similar makes me furious." His voice cracked slightly on the last word.

This was more than Niko had ever shared with her, or with anyone, about his family. It had always been the one door he kept shut. And here he was, opening it on his own.

It was comforting, hearing it. But it also worried her, knowing they shared this particular wound, and not knowing the full shape of what had caused his.

Picking out a suit was never supposed to turn into this. But neither of them had ever felt closer.

"You never told me about that. About your father." He said finally, after a long quiet stretch.

She shrugged. "I figured 'my dad left the second he found out his daughter was a freak' wasn't exactly fun pillow talk."

His half-smile told her the joke landed, even if her self-loathing underneath it landed harder.

"You're nobody's freak, Carly McPherson." He said, crossing to sit beside her on the bed, tucking her hair back, thumb stroking her warm cheek.

"You're ambitious. Stubborn as hell. A brat sometimes." A small smirk. "But you're strong, and full of more light than you give yourself credit for. It took me a long time to stop thinking of what I am as some kind of burden, and I refuse to let you think that way about yourself either. If your own father couldn't see what was right in front of him, he never deserved to know you at all."

She sniffled, wiping at her nose with her sleeve. "Do you just think of these things off the top of your head?"

He shrugged, smirking. "A gift. Reserved exclusively for you."

She smiled against his mouth when she pulled him in for a kiss that didn't even come close to expressing everything she felt in that moment. The safety, the comfort, the sense of being understood that he gave her with just a few sentences. Years of weight she'd been carrying since childhood felt, briefly, lighter. She only wished he'd let her return the favor someday.

The kiss lingered. She pulled back just far enough to rest her forehead against his, looking up at him.

"Not to sound like just as much of a softie, but I don't talk about this. Not even to Whitney." She admitted. "It feels good to not hold it in for once. Thank you."

"I told you. You never have to thank me for being there."

Her smile widened, and she kissed him again, slower this time, fingers tangling in his curls, tugging just enough to pull a quiet groan out of him. She shifted, hiking one leg over to straddle his lap, both hands threading through his hair while his settled on her hips, guiding the slow rock of her body against his.

He groaned against her mouth. "You've been testing my restraint a lot lately."

She giggled, peppering kisses along his jaw, his cheek, his nose, his neck.

"Screw it. Let's just skip this stupid banquet." She suggested. "Screw all the fake people who'll smile in my face after talking behind my back all year. Screw my responsibilities for one night. Let's just stay here."

"Ditching cringe high school festivities? Doesn't sound very Carly McPherson of you." He teased.

They both laughed when she shoved his shoulder for it.

"I'm serious, jerk." She twirled his necklace between two fingers. "I feel safe with you, and I just want to keep feeling that way. Preferably with a meat lovers pizza and 13 Going on 30 playing in the background."

"Ah, yes. The ridiculous rom-com you forced me to watch." He pecked her lips.

"'Forced' is a strong word for someone who was yelling at the screen the second Morgan got engaged to the wrong guy."

"Semantics." He muttered, rolling his eyes.

Her laugh filled the small space between them as she kept pressing kisses along his neck, her intentions clearly anything but innocent.

A shiver ran down his spine when her mouth found a sensitive spot near his pulse, her tongue ghosting the shell of his ear right after.

"Has anyone ever told you you're quite the little temptress?"

"Is that a yes?" She whispered, nipping his earlobe.

He closed his eyes briefly, letting himself enjoy the warmth of her body against his, her lips coaxing him toward something he had to remind himself to resist.

He groaned, regretfully pulling back so their noses touched, grinning at her pout.

"Here's the deal. We give the officials an hour. Just enough to clear your conscience so it's not nagging at you all night. Also so your mother doesn't send a search party for you, with a stake reserved especially for me."

She rolled her eyes, smiling as he cupped one hand against her cheek and held her hip with the other.

"Then for the rest of the night, it's just us. I promise."

Amusement crept into her eyes at how well he knew her — she could never actually skip her responsibilities without it eating at her the whole time.

She tilted her head like she was still deciding, even though the decision had already been made.

"I suppose I could negotiate that into my schedule." She shrugged casually.

He smirked, flipping their positions before she could react, her back hitting the mattress as he settled above her, cutting off her surprised laugh with a kiss. Fingers tangled in each other's hair, her smile pressed against his skin, and he had no choice but to smile right back into it.